90 days to breathe or speculate on trade?

The week is starting off with the market mood fluctuating between risk-on optimism after the trade truce between the U.S. and China and skeptical realism remembering all the other uncertain geopolitical issues, like Brexit. It’s a big week for oil, and U.S. nonfarm payrolls are due Friday alongside Canadian unemployment.

Reality vs. perception

The Saturday night dinner between President Trump and President Xi Jinping signaled hope for ending the current trade war between the two countries as is resulted in a 90-day truce.

Initially, markets turned risk-on with the news, but then the pessimists pointed to a lack of details in the agreement between the two leaders, and all the other volatile issues going on in the world.

The risk-on mood in the markets was relatively short lived, but the truce is still better for the global economy than another escalation in the form of tit-for-tat tariffs.

There are some apparent winners and losers from the agreement. President Trump said that China agreed to reduce and remove tariffs on U.S. autos entering China, helping boost automaker stocks. U.S. farmers didn’t receive much benefit from the meeting. There was no mention of lifting a China-imposed tariff on U.S. soybean exports to the country.

In the end, there is still more to come on U.S.-China trade relations, but for now we can breathe a slight sigh of relief.

Oil recovers

While Trump and Xi were having dinner in Buenos Aires, other deals were also being made at the G20 Summit. Saudi Arabia and Russia agreed to extend their pact to manage the oil market.

Then Alberta – Canada’s largest oil-producing province – said it would cut production starting next year to 325,000 barrels a day in an effort to boost prices.

A barrel of West Texas Intermediate climbed to $53.77 Monday morning, before dipping back to $52.24.

On Thursday, OPEC will meet in Vienna and the topic of production levels will certainly be on the agenda. Most recently, Qatar said it would leave OPEC to focus on natural gas.

U.S. markets closed Wednesday

U.S. federal agencies as well as the NYSE and Nasdaq will be closed Wednesday to honor President George H.W. Bush, who died on Dec. 1 at age 94.

The currencies markets could be slightly quiet on Wednesday, but there are still plenty of Eurozone politics to sway the pairs.

Nonfarm payrolls due Friday

The closely watched nonfarm payroll numbers for the U.S. in November are due Friday, expected to show a slowdown in new jobs created.

It’s estimated that 205,000 jobs were added in November compared to 250,000 in October.

Average hourly earnings are expected to stay steady at 3.1% growth YoY. A miss in either of these figures could add to the list of recent data points the Fed is considering when it comes to its rate path.

Canada will also add its jobs data for November at the same time. It’s expected that Canada will have added 10,000 jobs in November, compared to 11,200 in October.